Intersectional Environmentalist (The IE Foundation)

I founded Intersectional Environmentalist with the goal of creating educational resources + media projects to educate people, accessibly, about the intersections of both climate justice and environmentalism. To me, environmental justice and the fact that so many marginalized communities around the world don't have access to basic human rights + needs: clean air, water, and a safe and healthy environment is the most urgent issue facing our planet. With this funding, I could continue to grow the intersectional environmentalist team, create more research projects and educational materials for students globally, expand our operations globally and develop chapters for students looking to get involved and also build a network of other grassroots intersectional environmentalists groups so we can all grow together. We'd also use some of the funding to provide more regular grant opportunities for our communities and find more ways to create change on the ground and mobilize people to advocate for environmental justice. As a new organization we are underfunded, and I want to pay our team a living wage so we can make change in the world and also expand our operations to create the educational materials and research to help make environmental education more inclusive.

My name is Leah Thomas, I was born in St. Louis, MO and previously worked at companies like ECOS and Patagonia. I'm passionate about environmentalism and after the impacts of the Ferguson uprisings + the start of the black lives matter movement impacted my community I decided to study environmental science and get involved with environmental justice education and advocacy. In all the environmental spaces I worked in, there was a serious lack of diversity and inclusion and representation of Black, Latinx, Indigenous, and Asian perspectives even though communities of color globally are bearing the brunt of environmental injustice - even though they've contributed the least to the climate crisis. I believe that everyone deserves the right to breathe clean air, have access to a healthy environment which is what drove me to become an environmental justice educator. The goal of intersectional environmentalist is to help make the connection between social justice and environmentalism accessible for everyone, so they feel empowered to protect both people + planet and so unheard voices are amplified in this space. My goals are to help reshape the way environmental education is taught, utilizing creative mediums, so we can achieve environmental justice. 

Intersectional Environmentalist is unique because our goal starts with education and providing it for free, in accessible and easily understandable content. We use fact checked sources and have a team of researches that break down climate justice information so we can share with our audience and educators, because there is a serious lack of environmental justice knowledge and this topic isn't mandatory in most educational systems, including many higher education programs. Our community has grown very large in a short amount of time because people of color, who are facing the harshest impact of the climate crisis, aren't uplifted enough in the climate space which has led to environmental racism and injustice on a global scale. We are addressing the problem by meeting people where they're at, and providing free resources to learn how they can take action for both people + planet, learn about nuanced environmental topics and become apart of a community of intersectional environmentalists. We have a team of around 10 people, researchers, community organizers, artists + creatives and a council of over 20 diverse environmental activists to carry out our work, but desperately need funding to grow our community

Our work is innovative because the intersectional environmentalist pledge has reached over 1 million people and has been amplified and shared by some of the world's largest environmental organizations, because we helped raise awareness for intersectional environmentalism and the urgency of this practice (a term that I coined as an adaption of intersectional environmentalism). Our advocacy, utilizes untraditional means like social media and showing up as many places as possible (I often write think pieces for mainstream platforms about the subject: even playboy!) so we can go beyond just preaching to the environmental choir and spreading awareness to the every day person. Because of our advocacy work, we've even been applauded by the white house, who released a video titled "the intersectionality of the climate crisis" on IG as well as hosted a climate conversation on our platform so we can synthesize climate info for the every day person. We are more than willing to meet people where they're at and are unique because we avoid gatekeeping and want anyone to feel welcome to take action for people and planet. We are also BIPOC led and our team is majority BIPOC + young folx

We've helped bring the topic of intersectional environmentalism and the intersections of race, social justice and environmentalism to the mainstream conversation. In part, I feel like our advocacy has helped lead to real change even in government - like the creation of the first environmental justice council. Another change we are seeing is students who are requesting that environmental justice be taught and environmental educators coming to us for resources to help their students learn about advocacy for both people + planet and this is only in less than a year with our pretty small team. We are trying to dismantle systems of oppression in the environmental movement and beyond, and we're doing so through accessible education to help create change and empower people to take action. It's been very effective and we've helped shape other environmental organizations and curriculums already